Between sharing the road with heavy trucks and unsafe drivers, and fighting a sense of boredom as the stripes roll endlessly by, local commuters say keeping your mind occupied is one of the best ways to make wise use of time spent on the road.
Michael Newman, city engineer for the city of Temple, spends about an hour and a half on the road each day commuting to Temple from Georgetown.
Newman said long days and regular night meetings make his commute a little easier.
“I find myself missing some traffic on my trip home, with Planning and Zoning Commission and city council meetings every other week, plus every once in a while having meetings on special projects,” he said.
Newman, who has been with the city for nearly two years, said the drive to and from Temple is a cinch compared to his previous commute to Austin - a trip that was an hour and a half each way.
“The lanes are less traveled on the northbound side,” he said, adding that construction around Salado is becoming more pronounced and could result in slowdowns later.
Newman said he tries not to deal with business issues when he is driving.
“I try not to use the cell phone and usually don’t try to do business when I travel,” he said. “Actually, the commute helps me wind down. I often think of things on the way home or to work, and run through a mental checklist of things.”
And with gas prices skyrocketing, Newman said he is spending about $50 to $55 a week to fill up his 350Z Nissan, which he estimates gets 26.3 miles per gallon.
“I don’t drive it crazily,” he said of the relatively good mileage for a sports car. “I usually use cruise control and log lots of highway miles.”
Newman usually fills up in Temple to help out the local economy, he said.
Kay Glaser, a risk management specialist at Scott & White, commutes daily from her home in Cameron to Temple along Texas Highway 36.
Although she enjoys driving through the scenic countryside in spring and fall, she still has to deal with traffic.
“What time of morning you leave determines whether you will catch a lot of traffic or not,” she said. “I tend to leave earlier, about 6:30 or so.”
Since Texas 36 is a two-lane highway, she said traffic problems take a different form from the crowded Interstate 35 because of the tighter space for passing.
“Oh my goodness, you can look back and see just headlights behind you,” she said. “There’s a lot of traffic out there.”
She said she entertains herself mainly by listening to talk radio and oldies on a satellite radio station. She also uses the trip to work to think about work, and the trip home to relax.
“When I am coming home I’m just planning to do the same things I normally do around the house, or maybe relax,” she said.
She added that her husband, who is retired, often helps out with chores at home while she commutes.
She takes the 65-mile round trip in a Dodge Grand Caravan that gets about 23 miles per gallon.
“I can make it from Cameron to Temple and back all week on one tank of gas,” she said. “That helps, especially the way gas prices are right now.”
Mary Poché, director of marketing for Temple Economic Development Corp., said she travels at least 70 minutes one-way each day to get to Temple from her home in Leander - a trip she hopes will be faster come summer.
“As the crow flies, without having to go through three school zones and fighting I-35 traffic, it takes right at 50 to 55 minutes,” she said, adding that she is looking forward to summer when the school zones will be less of a factor.
With two grown children and one 16-year-old still at home, she said her and her husband’s lifestyle has always come with a commute between work and home, and the family simply adjusts by planning ahead.
She said coping at home means pre-cooking a lot of meals on weekends.
“We’ve all learned how to adjust - my daughter cooks, my husband cooks,” she said.
Ms. Poché has been with the TEDC for about six months. She and her family moved to Leander about five years ago.
“I’ve been working for corporate entities for all my career - 25 years,” she said. “When you work traditional hours you are involved in a rush hour situation and you learn to cope with it.”
Ms. Poché said she actually enjoys her time in the car during her commute.
“It gives me the time to ‘decompress,’” she said of the trip home. “Conversely, the commute to work gives me time to plan my day in my head. It really gives me a time for mental focus for what I have ahead of me.”
She often listens to classical music on the radio and, if the weather is good and she can use her cell phone safely, she talks with her mother with a hands-free headset.
“I very much use that hour to my benefit,” she said.
She said she usually drives her E series Mercedes the speed limit, but feels it is safer to drive the speed of the rest of traffic, even it is above the posted limit. She said she gets between 25 and 26 miles per gallon on the freeway.
And like Newman, the northbound lanes are less crowded, which helps reduce her stress level.
“There is a marked difference in the way I feel at the end of the day when I get home when I work here, as opposed to when I worked in Austin,” she said.
